


Ice Cream

by ohthelinsanity



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-20
Updated: 2015-01-20
Packaged: 2018-03-08 08:52:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,975
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3203243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohthelinsanity/pseuds/ohthelinsanity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When his seventeen year old half-sister Mikasa makes herself known by means of a horrible bus accident, Levi has no other choice but to take her under his wing. They share a father, a father he hasn't seen in 20 years, but as he grows closer to Mikasa, he learns that a lot can change in 20 years. And he finds that's hard to accept.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ice Cream

It is 4:23 in the afternoon when someone rings Levi’s house with a call that changes _everything._

He can’t be bothered to move from his make-shift study that he has set up in the corner of his living room—it’s littered with blueprints for the remodel of the business district in downtown Trost and he’s just in the middle of finishing up the last one so if it's who he thinks it is calling to bug him about the due date _Erwin can shove it._

Petra, the lovely wife that she is, picks up his phone for him. He can hear her voice echo off the newly renovated kitchen walls (for a moment, he reconsiders the habit of ignoring Erwin’s phone calls. After all, working for him is what _paid_ for their new high-end kitchen fit for the professional chef that Petra is). It sounds all happy and normal until confusion slips between bouts of unsettling silence

“Sir, I think you’ve been mistaken. You must have the wrong Ackermans.”

Levi assumes it’s another wrong number and doesn’t pay any mind.

There’s a clacking of her shoes on the hardwood as she drifts in and out of kitchen, the phone pressed tightly to her ear. “Yes…yes. I understand your concern, but my husband is an only child. He doesn’t have a sister.”

That is enough to make Levi put down his pencil and listen.

She wanders out into the living room, wiping a hand on her chef smock. A smudge of flour is swiped across the bridge of her nose and he can tell how it got there when she pinches and rubs at her face, giving another sigh. “Yes, fine. He’s right here.”

 _Who is it_ he mouths at her, and she whispers, “A doctor,” before she hands him the phone.

_“Mr. Ackerman?”_

Levi is already annoyed.  “What do you want?”

_“My name’s Dot Pixis, I’m a doctor at Trost Hospital—”_

“I know,” he interrupts, “My wife told me. Let’s cut to the chase. I overheard you say something about a sister. I don’t have one. Like she said, you have the wrong number.”

He starts to hand up but then the doctor practically shouts _“Wait!”_ over the phone. _“Please, just let me explain.”_

Why Levi decided to indulge this annoyance, he isn’t quite sure; he sums it up to the fact that he’s having trouble designing the greenspace for Erwin’s building—gardens were always the worst part. He doesn’t know why he doesn’t hire someone else to do it. So, listening to the doctor has got to be better than figuring out where to plant tulips—at least at the end of it he gets to call this Pixis guy an idiot. “I’m listening.”

 _“Two days ago, a 17 year old girl was admitted after being involved in a bus crash.”_ Levi remembers the crash being on the news—the bus driver had suffered an unexpected seizure and subsequently _tanked_ the bus through the midtown area—it had injured every single passenger and killed 5 people.   _“She was Jane Doe until someone retrieved her bag from the crash and we matched her to her ID. Her name’s Mikasa Ackerman.”_

It doesn’t ring a bell. Hell, her first name doesn’t even resemble _English_ so he’s sure there’s been a mix up. “I don’t know a Mikasa.”

_“Sir, if I may, your father was David Lee Ackerman, correct?”_

Anger sparks in him. Levi hasn’t seen the man in 20 years, and hasn’t heard a mention of his name in 10. But the fact that the doctor has just named him makes his head spin—it gives leeway to his claims. “Yes,” he bites through gritted teeth. The only thing that keeps him from hanging up is the very good use of past tense regarding David’s life. Good riddance, if you ask him. “Was?”

There’s a slight pause. _“…Yes. Your father has passed away. About five years ago.”_ The doctor goes on. _“We’ve gone through both David and Mikasa’s medical records. There's provided proof that he is both your father and Mikasa’s father. We believe she is your half-sister, sir.”_

“I know what a fucking half-sister is,” Levi groans. He’s not an idiot, not everything has to be spelled out for him. He can do the math. “What I don’t know is anything about this Mikasa person. It sounds like her mother’s problem.”

 _“Her mother’s passed away as well, sir. The same time as your father.”_ Another pause. “ _…were you not aware?”_

Nosy ass fucking doctor. “No. I didn’t really keep up with the man. We were not on good terms.”

 _“…I see,”_ and Levi knows the doctor is just lying.

“So, did you call me just to tell me I have a long lost sister or did you have something a little more important to tell me?”

Doctor Pixis coughs on the other end just as Petra hisses out his name in a reprimanding tone. He glances up and sees her glaring at him from the couch.

_“As I said before, she was involved in an accident. The extent of her injuries is incredibly severe.”_

Again, his curiosity gets to him. People have different definitions of “severe” and he likes to know if they’re talking amputation of stitches on her arm. “What’s broken?”

 _“A lot,”_ and the lack of any kind of medical training he used in that description is enough to make Levi understand that, yes, it is severe. _“She woke up this morning and from the tests we’ve been able to draw, we know she won't be able to walk for some time. She's got some back and leg injuries."_

“Jesus, the bus broke her fucking spine?” That’s enough for Petra to get off the couch and try to come and eavesdrop.

“ _In any case, her body’s so beaten, I’m not entirely sure she could stand on her own for a couple of weeks anyhow.”_

Levi starts rubbing at his forehead. He takes back his curiosity. He’d rather design a million boring-ass gardens than continue this conversation. “Would you please get to the point of why you called me?” But he’s pretty sure even his dumbass teenage neighbor could pick up where this was going.

_“Since her parents died 5 years ago, we asked her who she has been living with for the past four years. She wasn’t able to give us an answer. We suspect that she’s been living without legal guardianship.”_

“Shit….” Levi considers substituting rubbing his forehead for slamming his head into the desk. “The girl’s fucking homeless?”

_“In a sense, yes. We haven’t gotten any details. But we do know that he has no official address and no health insurance.”_

“How the fuck did that happen?” Levi snaps, angry. He might not know the girl, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that the girl’s parents died and no one bothered to make sure she was put somewhere safe.”

_“We asked her. She said she was put in a girl’s home while they searched for extended family, but she ran away after two months.’_

Great. A troublemaker. “Does she go to _school?”_

_“She says she lives here and she attends P.S 104 on a regular basis.”_

Well, that’s not surprising. P.S 104 is one of the worst public schools in the country, and it’s no surprise there was a slip in the records that let her get away without having to live with any fucking adults. “How old did you say she was again?”

_“17. Her birthday was 3 months ago.”_

“17,” Levi repeats. “That’s old enough for her to live on her own, isn’t it? Emancipation laws?”

Pixis sighs. _“That only works if she’s physically fit and capable to live on her own, which she isn’t anymore.”_

The doctor was going to make him say it. “You want me to be her fucking guardian, don’t you?”

His answer is immediate. _“I want you to help her. You are the only family she has left. There’s no way she can afford medical bills on her own.”_

“No,” Levi spits out. “I don’t care if we’re technically related, she’s not my problem.”

Petra’s breathing down his neck in an instant. “Levi! Don’t say that.”

Covering the receiver with his hand, he leans back in the chair to look at her. “What? It’s true. Besides, we don’t have the money to cover her bills either. I doubt I can get her on my health insurance even if I wanted to.”

“You can call in a favor!” Petra pleads. “Ask Erwin, you know he’ll help. Or Hanji! Between the four of us, I’m sure we could work something out.”

“There’s no way Erwin could pull this kind of favor out of his ass.”

Petra snorts. “He owns, like, half the city, I’m sure he can cover your sister’s hospital bills.”

“She’s not my sister.”

“Levi!” Petra yanks the phone out of his hands. “Hello, Dr. Pixis was it? How about for now, you tell us what room she’s staying in and we’ll visit her tomorrow.”

“I have work tomorrow,” Levi says flatly, but he knows as soon as she hangs up and calls Erwin he won’t, and that almost makes the field trip bearable. Almost.

She reaches over his shoulder and yanks his pencil down and scribbles a number on a stray napkin he left from lunch on the desk. “Uh-huh. Sure thing. That’ll be great. Thank you. See you tomorrow.”

Petra hangs up the phone and that’s that.

 

* * *

 

Though the name struck him as foreign, he didn’t actually realize that she would _look_ foreign—she’s Asian with hardly a trace of his side of the family. It gets his hopes up because he thinks that maybe the doctor did fuck up after all, but when her eyes flutter open he finally sees it—a dark hazel color.

The same color as Levi’s eyes, and the same color as their father’s.

He momentarily forgets Petra is at his side as Pixis introduces them—Mikasa has locked eyes with him, intense and unyielding. “This is Levi and his wife, Petra. He’s your brother.”

“We’re _related_ ,” Levi corrects, as if related is better than brother. It feels like it.

Mikasa doesn’t say anything. She just continues to stare at him, expressionless. And here Levi thought he was a master of indifference. She lifts her hand to scratch at her cheek, but is stopped when Pixis swats her from picking at the bloodied bandage.

“What happened?” and he nods to the injury under her cheek she was trying mess with—it’s a straight line (from what he can tell of the blood seeping through) that stretches from ear to mid-cheek.

“Pipe or glass, I don’t know.” She shrugs. "It'll scar."

Petra comes in to save the day with her soothing tone and appropriate amount of sympathy. “Does it hurt?”

“They have me on morphine.”

Ignoring Pixis’ comments about how he shouldn’t look, Levi wanders over to foot of her bed and picks up her clipboard: damage to the vertebrae, heavy laceration to her cheek, broken leg. Bruising must not be good enough to put on there but that’s certainly something he feels inclined to add. He looks up and spots her full name at the top of the sheet:

_Mikasa Ruth Ackerman_

His head snaps up and the look on his face must be something alarming, because Mikasa’s face finally makes way for expression: confusion.

“Ruth was my mother’s name,” he tells her, and it’s enough for her to bow her head.

Petra nudges at him, for what, he’s not sure, but he supposes he’s being rude again.

“Anyway,” Pixis clears his throat. “There’s a lot to discuss. Mikasa, if Levi agrees to be your guardian, you’ll be released under his care. If he doesn’t, then you’ll be put back in a girl’s home.”

Again, Petra elbows him (ow) and Levi realizes he’s forced to make some sort of decision. “I need to make a phone call,” he grunts. “Petra, keep her company.”

His wife smiles brightly as the boys leave the girls to some quiet conversation. Outside the hospital room, Levi almost pushes the doctor on his stupid ancient ass for the move he pulled. “I don’t appreciate being put on the spot,” he spats, but the doctor looks fucking smug. “I wasn’t lying about the phone call,” he sneers, and Pixis finally spins on his heel and walks down the hall.

The phone rings three times before it picks up. _“Smith.”_

“Erwin, it’s me.”

The professional tone drops immediately for a more familial one. “ _Oh, hey Levi.”_ He sounds softer than usual. _“Petra called me and said something about a relative in the hospital? Is everything alright?”_

“….Yes,” he drawls slowly. “The kid’s alive, if that’s what you’re asking.”

_“Kid?”_

He rolls his eyes. Erwin’s probably dreaming up some long lost son or daughter scenario. The sad part is that isn’t too far from the truth. “Turns out I have a half-sister. She was in that bus crash over on the avenue the other day.”

_“Oh. That’s terrible. I’m sorry, Levi.”_

“Save it, it’s not like I know the girl.”

But Erwin is smart. _“Is there anything I can do?”_

Levi takes a few extra seconds to swallow his pride. “Her hospital bills are going to be a bitch. She can’t walk. But she can learn again. I’ll need the best physiotherapist you know.”

He can practically hear him grinning on the other end. _“You sound rather determined to help the sister you seemingly don’t give a shit about.”_

“She’s pathetic, sitting in that hospital bed. An orphan that can’t walk. You know I can’t stand pathetic.”

Erwin hums. _“Of course. Don’t worry Levi, I’ll get it all taken care of.”_

If Levi hadn’t helped Erwin make a deal that earned him 4.5 million dollars last year, he’d feel bad asking for money. But in the end, he figures it’s fair enough. “Okay,” he mumbles. “Thanks.”

_“What was that? I didn’t quite hear you.”_

“I said thanks, shit-stain.”

 

* * *

 

Erwin’s help extends beyond hospital bills—Levi doesn’t know if he pays them or simply makes them disappear: the man has too many connections for his own good. But the guardianship papers go through at lightning speed: 24 hours to be exact. Erwin also calls Levi and tells him he’s set up Mikasa’s medical appointments for the next _5 months_ which is simply astounding. If this is what accepting favor is, maybe Levi should have considered it a long time ago.

Mikasa is ready to be released from the hospital a week after he meets her. In that week of time, Levi sees her twice, but Petra informs her she’s gone down there every day before her night shifts at the restaurant (“She should be comfortable around one of us.”) Their apartment is in a nice complex in the heart of historic downtown, and while it’s all one level, it’s a tad on the small side. There’s only one bedroom, but thankfully Petra’s idea to buy a couch with a pull out bed was a smart idea after all. Together the two of them get ready to bring Mikasa home.

Only on his way out the door to pick her up does he realize that they completely spaced on buying her a wheelchair.

The hospital has some, but they’re _shit._ It’s a two man job to get those things around the hospital. Levi glances at his watch and curses. He doesn’t have time to buy one, and he hardly wants to pay for one from the hospital.

An image of his dumb-ass teenage neighbor pushing his cancer ridden mother around pops in his mind and he curses again.

He walks out the door and takes a sharp right, knocking on the neighboring door with three quick raps. There’s some heavy footsteps before the door yanks open and Levi is greeted with the sight of dancing green eyes.

“Hey, Eren,” Levi clears his throat before Eren gets a chance to start rambling into tomorrow. “Can I borrow your mother’s old wheelchair?”

Eren looks surprised, which he should be. The only time Levi’s come over was to complain or tell Eren to stop scuffing his front door with his dumb bicycle that he brings up from the street. But Eren’s response is even more surprising.

“Do you want the one with the glow in the dark paint or the duct-tape flowers?”

And as Levi hauls the tape-covered wheelchair down to his car, he’s thankful for Carla’s recovery—only if it means she doesn’t have to sit in her son’s dumbass idea of decorations. Mikasa will probably hate him before she’s even moved in—and he feels like a brother probably should.

 

* * *

 

Petra’s at work, so he is alone as he wheels the chair into her bedroom. Mikasa’s ready, dressed in the street clothes that Petra’s brought along for her: a long button down dress. He wouldn’t have remembered that jeans would have been tough for her, and he’s thankful that his wife is a little more…considerate than he is.

“Sorry about the flowers,” he immediately tells her as he lines up the chair beside her bed. “I borrowed it from my dumbass neighbor. You can take it up with him, if you like.”

Mikasa doesn’t say anything as she tries to wiggle herself off the bed and onto the chair. It’s an impossible task given her broken leg and he can see her trying to hold on to her pride and do it herself. But if Levi had to swallow his pride this week then dammit, she will too.

He has an inkling she’ll protest so he doesn’t ask; he just kneels beside her bed, and offers his arms. A little reluctantly, she wraps her arms loosely around his neck and he hauls her off the bed—she’s heavier than he thought she’d be, considering how skinny she is—and places her as carefully as he can in the wheelchair.

Immediately, her hands go to the wheels and she starts to push herself around the room—she’s quite good at it. Underneath the yellow and green bruises on her arms he sees the muscle definition. But of course, as with all beginners, she makes a mistake and wheels herself straight into the wall.

But Levi doesn’t insist on pushing her. Instead, he opens the door and tells her to take a few practice rounds down the hospital hallways. After all, it would be better for her to scuff their walls than his.

 

* * *

 

As predicted, Eren is outside “watering” some window plants when he arrives (thanking every God that they live on the first floor. They don't have an elevator). He looks even more confused than he was when Levi asked for the wheelchair. Deciding to put him to work, he tosses Eren his house keys and tells him to open the door.

Eren looks down at Mikasa and smiles. “Hiya. I’m Eren. I’m Levi’s neighbor.”

Levi rolls his eyes. “Sometime today, Eren.”

“Right!” and he walks over to unlock the door.

Part of him thinks Eren is going to stick around, but he’s surprisingly considerate. “You can keep the chair, Levi. Let me know if you need anything else,” and he closes the door behind him.

He hasn’t thought this far ahead, but he assumes the first step is to show her around. “It’s a one bedroom, two bath. The kitchen’s recently been renovated. Petra’s a chef, so she does all the cooking. I do all the cleaning.”

She finally speaks. “What’s my job?”

“To learn how to walk again. It’ll make your life and everyone else’s easier. So you put all your energy into healing.” He wheels her out of the living room and into his bedroom. “You’ll be sleeping here until you aren’t so black and blue. Petra wants to keep an eye on you for the first few days, so I hope you don’t mind sharing the bed with her. It’s plenty big.”

Mikasa shakes her head. “I don’t mind. Thank you.”

“I’ll be out on the pullout couch. Once you’re healed, we’ll switch. Sound fair?”

She nods. “Thank you for letting me stay.”

Levi swallows thickly, unsure of what to say. “Yeah, well…”

The silence that falls isn’t _completely_ awkward.

So, it’s a start.

 

* * *

 

Despite the fact that she’s rolling in a metal chair, Mikasa is surprisingly quiet.

The summer that settles in is just as hot as the rest. Levi cranks up the AC and leaves the windows closed just like he always does: it keeps his papers from flying around and it keeps the bugs out of his apartment. It makes the place a bit of a cool oasis, so much that he sees Mikasa wrapping the spare blanket off the couch around her shoulders. Seems like a good enough solution, but it tends to fall off and get caught in the wheels.

Petra’s the one that suggests it while she’s making dinner. “You should open the window,” she whispers, nodding to where Mikasa is sitting alone in the living room, staring off into space with her hands folded neatly in her lap. “She keeps looking out there.”

“Maybe it’s because she longs to walk freely out the door,” Levi retorts, and he feels her flick a piece of onion at the side of his head. “If she wanted the window open, she’d do it herself. Or ask.”

“Levi,” she sighs. It’s loud enough to make Mikasa turn her head momentarily before she’s back to staring out the window. “She can’t and she _won’t._ She still feels like a stranger in this house.”

“What makes you say that?”

Petra’s patience is pretty thin, at least more so than his. “Go open the window,” she bites, chopping vegetables up on the cutting board a little more loudly than necessary. “And _talk_ to your sister.”

He has to resist rolling his eyes as he complies, walking over. She’s startled when his hands grasp the back of her chair to wheel her closer to the window—the light that pours in is golden and bright and he thinks it’s particularly nice day to watch the sunset. “Did you keep the windows open in your old home?”

Mikasa watches as he undoes the latch and yanks the window open. Warm and surprisingly dry air blows in and it can admit it feels nice if asked. “Some of them.”

He’s tossing the bait and she’s willingly taking it. Maybe Petra is right. She feels uncomfortable living as a stranger in his home and she's willing to talk. “What about the last home, before the bus crash.”

“Armin kept the windows open year round.”

Armin. She’s never mentioned an Armin. Well, to be fair, she’s never really mentioned anyone, not even David. He wants to ask, but at the same time dinner will be ready in about 10 minutes, so he tries to keep it light. “My mom kept the windows open all the time when I was a kid,” he tells her. “I couldn’t stand it.”

She frowns. “Then why’d you open—”

“I'm not a kid anymore. Besides, the air is a little stale. I think a breeze would be nice for a bit.”

A lightning bug lands on the open windowsill and lights up a few times before he flies away. It doesn’t bother him as much as he thought it would.

 

* * *

 

Slowly, Mikasa becomes a little more comfortable around him. He wouldn’t go as far as to say she they were good, but she answers all his questions without hesitation and even asks him a few herself. With a few weeks practice, they can go 5 or 10 minutes without an awkward pause.

But Levi figures it’s probably not a good idea for a 17 year old to spend all her time with a stuffy 34 year old. Petra’s considerably younger than him, but she’s still only 26, and adults are adults. Mikasa needs to spend a little time with someone her own age before she goes back to school in the fall.

“Do you remember Eren?” He asks her one day after they come back from a doctor’s appointment. The cast on her leg is finally off and while she’s still confined to the chair, she’s in the best mood he’s seen since she got here.

“The boy next door? Yeah, I remember.” She points to the window. “He passes by and says hello whenever he sees me by the window.”

“Oh?” he tries to sound intrigued. He knows it’s for her own good, but teenage puppy love is still disgusting. Eren could argue all he wanted, but that goofy grin on his face the day Mikasa moved in wasn’t hiding anything. “Did you invite him in?”

“No,” she says slowly, looking up at him. “You called him a dumbass. I thought you didn’t like him.”

“Eren _is_ a dumbass,” Levi agrees. “But that’s just because he’s a teenager. All teenagers are dumbasses. But he’s a good kid,” he nods to himself. “Takes good care of his mother.” And anyone who takes good care of a mother who sticks around is a good person in Levi’s books. “You should go hang out with him. Or whatever you kids call it these days.”

“All teenagers are dumbasses?” Mikasa asks, brow arched. “Don’t you think that’s a little presumptuous?”

“No,” he answers flatly. “All teenagers are dumbasses. Including you.”

“How so?”

There were a few things he could have said, the overarching one being _you ran away from home_ but he decides to say, “You let a bus completely fuck you up the ass.”

Her eyes crinkle and he sees her laugh for the first time.

 

* * *

 

Petra is normally with Mikasa during the day, and Levi is there with her in the evening, and the routine has worked out flawlessly, even if one of them has to move around their schedules. Mikasa hasn’t been left alone for long periods of time since she’s moved in.

But of course, all good things come to an end.

He gives her every phone and fax number he can imagine and puts it on the coffee table where she can reach it. He leaves all the doors open except the front one, where he places the key on a low-hanging hook where she can open it.

At work, he’s distracted. The heavy wind and rain taps loudly on the large windows of his own design as he sits in the conference room, listening to Erwin defend his plans for the new Sina & King office. Levi knows it looks okay but, yet again, they argue over the goddamn green space between the two towers. Everyone these days want to boast that they’re the most environmentally friendly. He supposes that’s a good thing, it would just be a little less annoying if they were doing it more for the good of the earth opposed to an aesthetic.

“I just don’t think it is _contemporary_ enough.” Niles Dawk says, and Levi rolls his eyes, he fucking does it, because Niles is the bane of his existence.

But thankfully, Erwin is the one with the fancy suit and tie and knows how to be civilized about this stuff. “Specifics would be a little more helpful.”

Niles turns to Levi. “I like the building, I do. I think it’s a new flair to your signature style but your green space…it’s stuck in the past. It looks like something my grandmother would have planted.”

“I think that’s a little harsh,” Erwin remedies. Really? Grandma's gardens sounds like a compliment to him. “But Levi, I see his point. It’s not that it’s bad, it’s just…it doesn’t _match.”_

“Exactly!” and Niles snaps his fingers like Erwin’s words were a fucking jeopardy answer.  “It doesn’t match. This is a lot of green space for a business district, we really can’t cut corners.”

Levi looks to Erwin for some assistance, but his boss just shrugs. “I’m afraid he’s right. It needs some work. But I think with how well you’ve designed the towers, the board will be more than willing to give you a generous extension to tweak the green space,” and the room collectively hums in agreement like the little soldier apprentices they are. Levi can’t wait to bitch about it with Erwin over a beer in a day or two.

The day stretches out as tediously as it always does. He manages to cut out of his day a little earlier than normal at around 3 and races home in hopes to find that his house hasn’t burned down with Mikasa still inside.

What he finds is much worse.

Her wheelchair is outside his front door, toppled over on one side. He hopes it’s a miracle he’s witnessing, but the likeliness of that occurring is slim. Panic rises up in his throat like bile and he’s even more alarmed to find his door, while closed, is completely unlocked. He all but kicks it in, her name jumping out of his throat. “Mikasa? Mikasa!”

There’s no one home.

His shoes slip on the wet floor his coat has made as he bolts out of his apartment and runs down to the neighbors. He knocks frantically, once, twice, probably a dozen times before the door is opened by a Ms. Carla Yeager.

“Carla, have you seen Mikasa?”

Lips curling in a slight smile, she steps aside to give full view of the living room, where Levi finds Eren with one arm around her shoulders, the other bracing her at the waist.

Several, several seconds go by but Levi watches as Mikasa takes a wobbly step.

He saves the lecture about how she’s not supposed to be on her feet _quite_ yet and instead gives her a small thumbs-up when she lifts her head to look at him; she has the same crooked grin as their father, but he thinks it looks much nicer on her.

 

* * *

 

Levi spends the next several days locked up in his apartment working out the new fucking green space for the building. It’s ridiculous. He spends years studying architecture and get slapped with garden duty.

When Petra isn’t taking her to physiotherapy in the morning, Mikasa takes to lounging on the couch. Levi finally has his bed back and Mikasa makes camp out in the living room. She can’t support her weight quite yet, but she's got the cast off and can move her legs around pretty easily, so she likes so stretch and bend and sit in all sorts of positions she hasn’t been able to do in days—he thinks she looks like Hanji’s cat and even shows her pictures for comparisons. Petra jumps in on the teasing and meows at her every time she passes the couch.

Learning what makes Mikasa annoyed is certainly a perk to having a sibling around.

One day, as he crumples up a piece of paper and tosses in the bin with all the other rubbish, he decides to annoy her a little more. “How’s Eren?”

“Fine,” she says shortly, and he can hear her moving around on the couch again. “Why?”

“Just asking. He helping you take any more steps?”

“A few,” she drawls. Again, she’s moving on the couch. She sure is getting a lot squirmier. “He took me to the park yesterday to practice.”

“Ohhhh, did he now?”

Petra, cooking in the kitchen overhears and joins in with theatrical kissing noises which definitely make Mikasa whine with embarrassment. But completely annoying her all the time isn’t going to get them on better terms, so he yields. “How many are you up to?”

“Nine.”

It’s two higher than it was a few days ago. “Good,” he nods, attention divided between her and a hedge he’s drawing. He reaches for a pink pencil and starts to shade in some flowers. “You’re getting stronger.”

“Not strong enough.”

From the kitchen he hears Petra briefly in her cutting before she starts up again, the skillet hissing with oils. Levi spins around in his chair, slowly, and sees her picking at the long strands of her hair, unknowing of his scrutinizing gaze. Grabbing the colored pencils off his desk, he snags a clipboard from underneath the desk and walks over to sit beside her on the couch.

“I need some help,” he sighs, maybe a little dramatically judging by the arch of her brow. “I’ve been assigned to redo this garden,” he shows her all the schematics and different blueprints. “But they say it hasn’t gotten a contemporary flair to it. What do you think?”

For a moment, Mikasa doesn’t move, only stares at her like she thinks he’s punk-ing her. But eventually, she takes the papers from his hands and gives them a look over. “They’re boring,” she eventually says, tossing them back in his lap.

Well goddamn it. Those were the new ones, too. But if a 17 year old thinks it’s boring, he knows it is. It’s not like he even liked the redo that much anyhow. Mimicking Erwin from earlier he tells her, “Specifics would be helpful.”

“Are you even a landscaper?” She mumbles, looking at the dual towers of the office complex. But it only takes her a few seconds before she comes up with a solution. “Vertical gardens.”

He blinks. “Vertical gardens?”

“Mmhm,” she hums, shuffling the papers to show him the allotted green space. “Do a two-story backdrop feature wall with flowers and then put the leafy greens and vines on the tower walls.”

“That’s…” he looks back through his schematics. “Not a bad idea, actually.” Put the green space in the sky, who would have thought. “It would put a lot of room for some benches and shit so people could actually use the courtyard for lunch breaks and shit.”

“Cool,” Mikasa nods. “Glad I could help.”

“Yeah,” he drawls, shooting her a confused look. “Yeah, how’d you come up with that so fast?”

“I don’t know?” She shifts on the couch, this time curling away from him. “I grew up on a farm outside of town, if that helps. I guess I know plants and stuff.”

Levi can’t quite believe what he’s hearing. “Wait, what? You lived in a farm? With David?”

Mikasa looks a bit like a deer in headlights. He doesn’t know why she looks so scared—it’s not like he was yelling. Or was he? “Yes?”

“David worked on a _farm_? Doing actual work and shit?”

Again, she nods. “Yeah. What’s so weird about that?”

For the first time in years, Levi tries to conjure up a mental image of his father—it’s hard though. After all, how can you remember someone who was never really around? “Everything,” he snorts. “He was the laziest fuck I’ve ever known.”

Petra calls them for dinner, but he loses his appetite when he notices that Mikasa can’t quite look him in the eye.

She may have taken nine steps forward but he’s taken a few steps back.

 

* * *

 

“You’re going to private school.”

This is it. _This_ is the most surprised he has ever seen Mikasa. “Pardon?”

Fuck, where’d she learn to be so polite. Sure as shit wasn’t from David. “Private school. As in not PS one-oh-fucking-four. That school is shit and you know it.”

She shrugs. “It gets the job done.”

He rolls his eyes and fights the urge to point out that they didn’t even check to see if she was living with a goddamn adult.“Yeah, well, not anymore. You’re going to Trost Academy in fall.” He mentally checks his calendar. It’s only mid-July. “I’m giving you some warning since there might be a summer reading assignment. We can go check sometime this week if you want.”

Petra smiles at her from the other end of the couch. “Eren goes there. Maybe he’ll take you.”

They both notice the blush on her cheeks. “Maybe,” she agrees, but he can see she’s still uneasy, and it isn’t the Eren thing. “But are you sure? Private school is expensive. And my medical bills…”

Petra shakes her head. “It’s not your job to worry about the money. You’re the kid. Let us worry about it.”

“We can afford it just fine. I want you to get a good education. So that’s where you’ll go.”

Mikasa sucks in a breath and looks at the floor. “I don’t know.”

Silence settles between the three of them and Levi starts to try and pick her apart. The answers to her hesitation, the solutions he comes up with are _ugly_ and he would like anything but to believe them. “Are you going to run?”

She snaps her head up and he sees her eyes glossed over. “I—”

He cuts her off. “Be honest.”

Her mouth falls into a hard line as she purses her lips. “No, I won’t.”

“You won’t, or you can’t?”

Her lips part to let loose a bitter laugh. “Does it matter?” and the wheelchair sits like an elephant in the room.

No. He supposes it doesn’t.

 

* * *

 

He hears a crash in the middle of the night.

How it doesn’t wake up his wife, he isn’t sure, but then again he’s been told he’s a very light sleeper. It may not have been as loud as he thought. But just as he thinks he might have imagined it he hears it again, followed by a soft sound of a choked sob.

She’s a heap of a mess in the middle of the floor, desperately trying to stand on her own two feet without any assistance. The borrowed wheelchair is an equal mess sprawled out on its side a good few feet away from her.

Levi’s at her side in an instant, arms hovering over her to help her up once she stops squirming. But she’s stubborn. “No,” she gasps, weakly pushing his hands away. “No, I can do it.”

He eyes the clock on the wall in the living room: 2:23 am. “What are you doing up?”

“Practicing,” is her curt reply.

Forgive Levi, he didn’t buy it. “Do you need to go to the bathroom?”

_“No.”_

“Goddamn it Mikasa!” he growls. “Just _talk_ to me.”

Suddenly, he doesn’t know what to do. The few painful sobs he heard that woke him up downgrade into girlish schoolgirl tears—it reminds him that she’s still just a kid, no matter how much taller she was. She stuffs a few fingers in her mouth to muffle the cries, but he sees her body shiver like it’s cold, sees tears roll down her cheeks like they’re coming off a waterfall.

His kid sister is crying, and he doesn’t know what to do.

He starts with lowering his voice. “Mikasa,” he whispers, and he lays a gentle hand on the top of her head. “What’s wrong?”

It all comes out after that. “I’m useless,” she moans, and he swears he hears some bitter laugh in there underneath a hiccup. “I can’t do anything for myself. And you have to deal with it.”

Flowery reassurance about how she never put him in any kind of disadvantage or caused him any trouble isn’t going to be useful. He tries a little honesty. “I got over it.”

Doesn’t work, judging by the dirty looks she throws him. “This whole arrangement isn’t fair to you. You shouldn’t have to take care of me. You shouldn’t have to send me to school. A few weeks ago you didn’t even _know I existed_.”

Levi snorts, patting her head a few times in means of comfort. “Well, you’re not to blame for that. That’s David’s fault. I told you he was the biggest fuck I ever knew.”

She shrinks away from his touch, removing his hand from her head. Just as quickly as she broke down, she composes herself, staring at him in the darkness—they’ve left the window open on accident, and the moonlight comes in to catch the side of her face in unflattering light. “Why do you say that?”

“Hmm?”

“Why do you say that?” she repeats a little more firmly. “What did Dad do to you?”

Levi sputtered, almost laughing. “He didn’t do anything. That was the whole damn problem. He was never around. He was out doing drugs and shit all the time. Came home smelling like liquor all the time. _Real_ piece of work, that man; skipped out on me and my mom when I was twelve. I’m sure you can relate.”

Mikasa looks shell-shocked. “He….he was like that?”

What was she, new? “Yeah.”

“To you?”

“Yeah, to me.” Levi sighs, pinching at the bridge of his nose. “I’m just sorry he dragged another little family into it.” He pauses to roll his shoulders. “What killed him, in the end?” he asks, as if the question was a simple as asking what she had for lunch the other day.

She swallows thickly. “A gun.”

Levi clucks his tongue disapprovingly. “Probably drug related. As always.” He pats her head again. “I’m just sorry that—”

“It wasn’t drug related.”

“Huh?”

She stares at him, hard. “It had nothing to do with that. It was a random act of violence. My parents were mugged and they were killed when I was twelve.”

Suddenly, he’s hit with the realization that he has no idea what she’s been through. “Were you there?”

 _“Yes,”_ she snarls. “I was there. I saw everything. So don’t tell me it was because of a deal gone wrong. We were coming back from the movies downtown. Dad just bought ice cream.” Mikasa suddenly calmed down as she recalled the memory. “I got chocolate, but Dad got mint just so that I could have a few bites of that as well, since I couldn’t choose.” Her teeth caught her bottom lip. “When the police came and got me, I still had ice cream on my shirt.”

Levi has a hard time picturing David wearing khakis and a nice shirt, going to the movies with his picturesque wife and daughter. It’s not the image he remembers: all he sees is fuzzy outlines of torn t shirt and tank tops, of jackets that are a size too big, of a five o’clock shadow that is anything but flattering. “I’m sorry,” he tells her.

“No,” she laughs, “You’re not.” She throws him a sad smile. “And I don’t blame you.”

“Mikasa—”

“He never told me about you.” Mikasa whispers. “I don’t understand why he never _told_ me about you. He never even said that he was _married_ before.” She shakes her head in disbelief. "He was nothing like you say he was. He never did any of that stuff around me. I loved him. He was a good father. I just don't understand."

Technically, he wasn’t married, but Levi thinks that’s just unnecessary salt in the wound. “Like I said, David he was….a real piece of work.”

She sniffs, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. Gross. “Yeah, I suppose he was.”

The pity party on the floor is quite pathetic and as Levi has always said, he doesn’t _do_ pathetic. “Okay, let’s get you up and back on the couch.”

Mikasa allows him to help her to her feet, but she draws the line at being completely carried back to bed. They take two steps toward the couch when she blurts out, “Wait.”

“What?”

“….The bathroom couldn’t hurt.” He rolls his eyes but turns the two of them around.

It is seventeen steps to the bathroom and seventeen steps to the couch. She still can’t do it on her own, but he gets away with only one hand on her waist.

And while he lies in bed and tries to go back to sleep, he replays each and every step while trying to remember the taste of ice cream.

 

* * *

 

“I’m pathetic,” Levi announces to his bedroom ceiling one night, when sleep won’t come.

He feels Petra turn in their bed until her hair is tickling the nape of his neck, her lips on his bare shoulder. “You can’t blame yourself,” she tells him, because his wife is a mind reader and she knows him best. “It’s not your fault your father left.”

He hums in agreement because he _knows that_ but facts don’t quite eliminate the dull ache he feels radiating through his chest. If he’s lucky it’s actually heartburn and not him missing the piece of shit father he hadn’t seen in 20 years. If he’s lucky, it’s not the feeling of him wondering why he wasn’t good enough.

But Petra goes back to sleep and Levi is as unlucky as he’s ever been.

 

* * *

 

 

Come August, Mikasa doesn’t need the wheelchair anymore and she’s more than thankful to return it to Carla. She still needs the assistance of a cane, but Levi can see that she really doesn’t mind it—especially when Eren comes over and insists on painting her cane with glow in the dark paint as well.

Most of her day is still spent practicing and building up her strength. She paces holes in the floors and goes out for walks with Eren for hours at a time, so Petra tells him. Levi thinks this is good. She’s getting better. Sure, she’ll have to show up to school with a cane, but it’s sure as shit better than a wheelchair. Things are good.

Until one day, she doesn’t come back.

Levi knocks heavily on the Yeager’s doors and a bit of his heart sinks when he sees Eren. He asks if he’s seen Mikasa, but he says no, he hasn’t seen her since yesterday. He offers to look, and Levi is more than thankful when Eren rips his coat off the hanger and promises to go check all their normal hang-outs.

It’s well past midnight and he’s still awake, busying himself with the final touches on the building project when he hears a key turn in the lock, and the front door opens. Mikasa tiptoes inside (as much as one can with a cane) but Levi doesn’t care much for quiet at the moment.

“Where have you _been?”_

She blinks owlishly at him, as if the stunt she just pulled wasn’t outlandish. “Armin’s,” she answers easily.

“Armin?” Levi repeats, getting out of his chair. “Who in the fuck—” He stops just as the wind whistles through the open window and then he remembers. Armin was the one who always kept his windows open.

“I don’t have a phone,” she explains quietly. “I’ve been gone for three months. I didn’t want him to think I just skipped out on him.”

He relaxes a bit. She’s back. She didn’t run, she was just being a dumbass teenager making dumbass decisions. “He an old boyfriend or something?”

To her credit, she doesn’t squirm or look embarrassed; she simply shakes her head. “No, he’s a little more important than that.”

Suddenly he’s aware he doesn’t know anything about her. He knows how her parents died but that’s _it._ Sure there are the little things he’s picked up form living with her, but it seems small compared to her life he hasn’t been a part of. How did she get by on her own for so long? What was it like? Who exactly was Armin? Were the others like him?

The clock reads just past 1 in the morning. Really, she shouldn’t be out this late (even if she hasn’t had parents or guardians in 5 years, he knows she isn’t stupid enough to think this is favorable behavior) but he decides the lecture can wait over breakfast when he has a boiling cup of coffee in his hands. “Mikasa.”

She flinches, and he doesn’t know why. It bothers him that he doesn’t know why. The life she had for the past five years is a mystery to him.

“…let’s invite Armin out for dinner at Petra’s sometime. I’d like to meet him.”

“Why?”

He shrugs. “I’d like to thank the man who took care of you.”

Finally, she allows a smile. “Okay.”

 

* * *

 

Turns out Armin isn’t a _man_ but a _boy,_ and barely sixteen at that. He’s all long blonde hair with a wiry frame and a girlish face and it reminds Levi of what Erwin looked like as a kid. Eren and his mother tag along for dinner as well, but what Levi doesn’t expect is for Armin to drag with him his bag of bones grandfather who looks like he’s going to fall apart at any second.

“I heard Mikasa spent a lot of time with you,” Levi tries to bring up casually once one of Petra’s waiters brings along their meal. Eren looks a little stricken but Mikasa remains impassive, eyes drifting to Armin’s grandfather.

“We did what we could to help her,” is all his grandfather says.

“Well,” Levi sighs, “It was more than enough. Thanks for looking after her.”

Armin smiles brightly. “It was more of her looking after us! She helped so much in the shop. Did you know she can lift, like, 150 pounds? ” And just like that, Mikasa’s past goes from stereotypical tragedy to something a little warmer: something that smells like old books and sea salts.

Levi, for one, is welcome for the change in perspective.

 

* * *

 

“Dad didn’t hate you, you know.”

Levi stops walking, let’s the strawberry ice cream on his cone dribble down to lace around his fingers in a sticky mess. “You said he didn’t mention me.”

Mikasa shrugs. “He didn’t. But he didn’t hate you.”

He really, really doesn’t want to get into this. “You’re not the kid he left, Mikasa.”

She slinks away, careful to make sure her ice cream doesn’t dribble down her tank top. “I’m just trying to make things better, that’s all,” she mumbles.

With a sigh, he drops his clean hand on her shoulder and gives it a squeeze. “Maybe he didn’t hate me. But he certainly didn’t care about me.”

Hazel eyes go wide. “Don’t say that, you don’t know—“

“If he did, it wasn’t enough. He would have called me, at the least. Told you about me.” Levi’s desperately trying to hide the raw and scratchy feeling creeping up his throat. He hasn’t gotten emotional around her yet, and he’s not going to start now. “It’s okay, though.”

Mikasa takes an unflattering bite of her ice cream, and chocolate smears in the corner of her lips. “How is it okay? Dad lied. I thought I knew him, but I guess he was lying the whole time.”

“No, no.” The ice cream in the cone is mostly on his hand at this point, so he drags Mikasa over to the nearest park bench and sits the two of them down as he tosses the melted mess into the garbage. “Look, he might have kept his past from you. He left me and that’s a shitty thing to do. But let me ask you something. Was David there every day when you woke up?”

Mikasa nods.

“Did he spend time with you? Cook you breakfast? Play dumb kids games with you?”

Another nod.

“Did he tuck you in and tell you that he loved you?”

“Yes,” Mikasa whispers. “He did.”

Levi gives what _passes_ as a smile for him. “Then he learned something. He messed up with me, but he didn’t mess up with you. He got it right the second time. He finally learned how to be a dad, for you. I can forgive him for that.”

She quirks a brow. “You can?”

He leans over and instead of wiping the chocolate mess on her cheek away, smears the strawberry ice cream from his hands on her nose like a good brother should.

“I can.”

 

* * *

 

The first day of school proves to be chaotic—most of it is Levi arguing that Mikasa needs to take her cane to school and her yelling back that she’s _fine_ and she’s stopped limping for the _most_ part and a bunch of other bullshit that goes against everything her doctors and tests have shown. But if there’s anything stronger than a mended bone it’s Mikasa’s will and he drops the matter, telling her if she falls in the hallway and breaks something else he’s _not_ cleaning it up.

Eren’s waiting for her in the open doorway as she rushes back in to the kitchen to grab the almost-forgotten lunch Petra made her. “Have a good day, sweetie,” Petra says and Levi is mildly surprised when Mikasa mumbles a thanks and leans down to peck his wife on the cheek.

Surely he thinks that is the end of the affection displays but then Mikasa’s locking eyes with him and dread pools in the pit of his stomach. He looks over to see Eren have this smug look on his face before Mikasa barreling over at impressive speed (maybe she doesn’t need the cane after all) and collecting him in a warm hug.

“Gross,” Levi grunts, pushing her off him. Mikasa barks out a laugh, one he hasn’t quite heard that loud before. But then again, it might be some of Eren’s peals of laughter from the doorway. “Don’t do that ever again.”

She seems rather smug though, so he thinks it will probably, most definitely, happen again. “I’ll see you later, Levi,” she says quietly, hauling her book bag up on one shoulder and following Eren out the door.

His phone rings and he’s not surprise to hear Erwin on the other line. _“The revisions you presented for the green space got approved by the board. They were seriously impressed.”_

“Isn’t that my job?” Levi teases.

 _“Even I was impressed.”_ Erwin continues, ignoring the jab. “ _It wasn’t like your normal stuff, it was really…fresh. I liked it a lot. How’d you come up with the designs anyhow?”_

He manages a smile.

“My sister helped.”

**Author's Note:**

> I've worked on this forever!!!! I took a break from my other fics because I finally hit some major inspiration with this one and I wanted to finish it as soon as possible. I really hope you liked it!!!!


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